


Four Corners of a Mattress

by gerardsjuarez



Category: The Used
Genre: Domestic, Established Relationship, M/M, Polyamory, The Used as a ship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-21
Updated: 2020-10-21
Packaged: 2021-03-08 19:55:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,563
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27132137
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gerardsjuarez/pseuds/gerardsjuarez
Summary: Quinn’s bed was not made for four people. Did that stop the other three from cramming themselves onto his queen and sleeping like rocks? Absolutely not.
Relationships: Bert McCracken/Dan Whitesides, Jepha Howard/Bert McCracken, Jepha Howard/Dan Whitesides, Quinn Allman/Bert McCracken, Quinn Allman/Dan Whitesides, Quinn Allman/Jepha Howard, Quinn Allman/Jepha Howard/Bert McCracken/Dan Whitesides
Comments: 4
Kudos: 14





	Four Corners of a Mattress

**Author's Note:**

> unpopular ship but here i am once again projecting my poly preferences into fics lol. hope u enjoy

Quinn’s bed was not made for four people. Did that stop the other three from cramming themselves onto his queen and sleeping like rocks? Absolutely not. He wondered why on earth he was awake until he heard someone move and shut off the alarm clock.

“Who set it?” Bert slurred, sounding exhausted.

“It was Jeph.” Dan said.

“Jeph?” Bert replied and when Quinn opened his eyes, Jepha was tucked under his arm sound asleep.

Quinn looked at the other two, “I’ll get him up.”

“Yeah but why did he set the fucking alarm?” Bert grumbled, getting out of bed. His hair was a bird’s nest, “It’s fucking Sunday.”

“We have shit we need to get done.” Jepha yawned, muffled by the material of Quinn’s shirt.

“Whatever.” He marched out of the room and Dan followed, asking Bert to turn on the coffee pot.

He was still sleepy but he could get up if he wanted to. Hot coffee sounded amazing, actually. He stretched a little bit only for Jepha to make a noise and hold onto him tighter.

“Morning, baby.” He chuckled, brushing Jepha’s newly dyed black hair away from his face. 

They’d dyed it the night before and it looked pretty black. Jet black. His hair was growing out, too. Quinn thought he looked really handsome. 

He told him as much, “You’re hair turned out really good.”

Jepha was pretending he didn’t like being petted, glaring up at him through his fringe. 

“You’re cute.” He said and gently pushed at him until he detached his grip on Quinn. He rewarded him with a kiss on the forehead and a tug on the arm, “Get up. We have to go to the store.”

“Fuck off.” Jepha groaned.

“Will do.” He rolled his eyes, “You’re the one who set the alarm to get shit done.”

In the kitchen, Dan had his arms around Bert, the two of them watching the coffee drip into the pot. Quinn put some bagels in the toaster. Not everyone ate breakfast but he knew that at least one of them would eat something if Quinn made it. 

He jumped when a warm hand touched his waist, “Whatcha making?”

“Bagel.” Quinn replied, “Want one?”

Dan nodded, “Want some coffee?”

“Definitely.” He nodded.

Behind them, there was a frustrated grunt, “Danny, can you reach my favorite cup for me?”

“Sure thing, pipsqueak.” He chuckled and went to go help Bert.

Quinn got down two plates and put cream cheese on their bagels. Dan touched his hand and smiled when he sat down next to him at the dining room table.

...

“Does this look phallic to you?”

Quinn looked up from where he had been squinting at the grocery list, trying to decipher Bert’s scrawl, “Everything looks phallic to you, Jeph.”

“Yeah but does it look phallic to  you ?” He gestured with the gourd in his hand.

He shrugged, “Maybe if you tilt your head.”

Jepha did just that and hummed, putting it back on the display, “Well, what do we need now?”

He looked back at the list, “I think it says ‘bother bread lady’?”

“Oh, I know what that means. The bread lady gives him free slightly crushed bread from vendors that they can’t sell.” He started off toward the bakery and Quinn hiked the basket up his arm before following.

Bothering the bread lady consisted of her making eye contact with Jepha and handing him a bag of raisin bread with a smile. Quinn checked it off of the list, holding the cap to the pen in his mouth. He looked up while he was checking things off and caught Jepha looking at him with an affectionate smile. He usually got told off for chewing on pen caps. 

“You okay?” Jepha asked.

“I’m... alright?” He replied, confused by the question.

“Just making sure.” He said and waited for Quinn to put the pen away before he held his hand and led the way to get what they needed next. 

Jepha wasn’t really all that physically affectionate, that was just how he worked, not just with Quinn. So when he went out of his way to hold Quinn’s hand or cuddle him, he nearly almost savored it. And he loved holding hands with Jepha, especially in public where everyone would see them being stupid and happy. He looked down at their intertwined fingers and smiled as he made yet another joke about something looking like a dick.

...

When they got home, Bert burst through Quinn’s bedroom door, “Jeph!”

“Oh, fuck.” Jepha said, putting down the groceries on the kitchen counter.

“I wrote a poem about you while you were gone.” He grabbed Jepha’s wrist and started pulling him toward the living room.

“We were only gone for an hour.” He mumbled but let Bert manhandle him until he was sitting on the couch across from Bert.

Quinn just shook his head and started putting stuff away, listening to Bert talk in the next room. He set aside a bag of flavored popcorn for Dan, knowing that if he put it in the pantry again, he’d give Quinn the squished popcorn is not good popcorn speech. There wasn’t very many groceries they needed that week so he was done pretty quickly. 

He poured himself a cup of coffee from the cold pot from earlier that day, heating it up in the microwave. The poem that Bert wrote was a lot sweeter than his usual stuff. A lot of the times, he’d write about sex in big long metaphors that Quinn thought were kinda graphic but this one was just a simple love poem about Jepha. It was making  him  blush, he was almost certain Jepha was, too.

He was just about to peek around the corner when Dan came into the kitchen, “Did you get-“

“Right here, babe.” He handed Dan the bag of popcorn, “Don’t eat it all, though, Bert and I are making dinner tonight.”

He leaned against the counter, “Oh, yeah. That homemade pasta recipe he found, right?” 

Quinn nodded, “Yeah, he had me buy fake cheese and everything.”

That made Dan chuckle, “There’s an 80s movie marathon on TV, wanna join me?”

“Sure.” 

The 80s movie in question ended up being E.T. and Quinn wasn’t mad about it. Dan was sitting up while Quinn was kind of half laying down, his head on Dan’s chest. One of Dan’s arms rested on his shoulder, hand in Quinn’s hair while his other hand was in the bag of popcorn. Occasionally, Dan would offer some to Quinn and he’d take some. He’d chosen some maple flavored popcorn this time. It was definitely better than last week’s bag which was ‘chipotle inspired’. 

“You falling asleep down there?” Dan asked during a commercial break, wiping his hand on the bedsheets before putting the half empty bag to the side.

“Mmm.” Quinn said and held onto him tighter.

“If you sleep this late in the day, you won’t sleep tonight.” He jostled him a little bit until he sat up enough to rest his head on Dan’s shoulder.

“You guys keep me awake enough to be sleepy this time of day.” He yawned.

Dan brushed his fingers against Quinn’s cheek, “Yeah but you love us.”

“Yeah, I guess I do.” He sighed.

Dan kept moving his fingers along Quinn’s jaw, “You need to shave.”

“I wanna try growing it out again.” He explained.

“Like a full beard or sexy stubble?” 

Quinn snorted, “Sexy stubble.”

“That’ll look good. Lotta upkeep, though.” He pinched Quinn’s cheek and stopped petting his face.

With a shrug, he said, “The price to pay for being sexy, I guess. Now, shush, it’s back on.”

Dan was quiet for only a second when he said, “Hey, Quinn.”

He groaned, “E.T.’s dying dude, what do you want?”

“I love you.” 

It physically hurt not to smile when Dan’s hand moved from being around his shoulders to around his middle, “I love you, too.”

...

Bert had flour on his nose. Quinn wasn’t sure how it exactly got there but he laughed and grabbed a nearby dish towel and got it off. Bert grinned and wiped his nose with his hand, getting more flour onto it. He rolled his eyes and went back to the dough on the counter for the biscuits. 

The pasta was boiling in a pot nearby. Bert was working on the cheese sauce - or was supposed to be working on it. Halfway through, he started messing with Quinn and flicking flour at him as well as making him try spoonfuls of the cheese sauce every two seconds to make sure it was perfect. Quinn was pretty sure he had flour in his hair at the very least.

He was struggling to keep the biscuits from sticking to his hands as he shaped them into balls to put on the baking sheet. One in particular wouldn’t get off of his hand no matter how much flour he used. God, the pan was gonna be hell to clean later.

“God, fuck.” He said, flailing his hand to get the shit off of it, only making a mess and not really removing any sticky dough.

“I think I didn’t add enough water.” Bert said and squinted at the mess in front of Quinn before looking up at him. His expression changed pretty quick, “Quinny, it’s just biscuits, okay? They don’t have to look pretty to taste good. Now, here, go wash your hands.”

He took the dough and bent plastic spoon from Quinn’s hands and put them on the counter. When Quinn came back with clean hands, Bert immediately covered them with vegetable oil.

“Listen, I know this looks counterproductive but it seems to be sticking to the flour. It might be a little more slippery but it shouldn’t stick as bad.” He explained.

He was right about the sticking. He smeared some on the sheet as a precaution, too, and started plopping the dough down onto the sheet one by one.

“You’re doing good, honey.” Bert kissed him on the cheek and Quinn turned his head to kiss him properly the second time, “Mm, you taste like cheese sauce.”

“That’s your doing.” Quinn said and Bert flicked flour at him again.

...

“Jeph, if you touch my thigh one more time, I’m gonna smack you.” Dan said and a few seconds later he smacked Jepha’s arm.

“You can cop a feel after dinner, Quinn put his heart and soul into those biscuits.” Bert said, “Also invite me, the fuck.”

“But I haven’t had Dan to myself in awhile.” Jepha groaned.

Bert made a show of rolling his eyes and brushing his hair from his shoulder, “Fine.”

The biscuits were okay, Quinn thought. They were a lot better when he dipped it in the cheese sauce. He thought the fake cheese would taste funny but it didn’t, oddly enough. Maybe he could get used to plant based alternatives. Then again, he’d miss cereal.

Someone kicked him from under the table and when he looked up, it was Bert, “What?”

“Well. Jeph and Dan wanna be together tonight... why don’t we?” He smirked at Quinn before shoving a massive bite of pasta into his mouth. 

He twirled the pasta around on his plate with his fork. Jepha had brought out the good silverware since the food ‘looked fancy’, “I don’t know if I’m really in the mood tonight. Sorry, Bert.”

“No, hey, don’t be sorry. I’m not disappointed.” Bert reached across the table and touched Quinn’s wrist.

Bert wasn’t looking at Quinn, though. He was exchanging looks with the rest of the guys. Quinn couldn’t look at them. They all had matching concerned expressions. 

“I know. Sorry.” He looked down at his plate.

Bert squeezed his wrist before pulling away, “Say sorry again and I’ll give you a reason to.”

That made Quinn smile, “Shut the fuck up.”

...

After dinner, Quinn took a shower to get all the flour and shit out of his hair. He’d gotten a couple joking questions from his boyfriends like ‘need any help’ and ‘got room for one more?’ Sometimes he wanted to just take a shower, dammit. 

But he understood why they were trying to make him laugh. He wasn’t dumb, he knew he was being off. He just - he didn’t know what it was that was off. He just felt... unplugged. Yeah, that was a good way to describe it. Unplugged.

When he got dressed, he put on a hoodie of Bert’s so he had something to cover his wet hair when he went to check the mail. Bert was totally making out with Jepha on the couch when he passed and maybe it was a little gross but he still thought he was damn lucky to have the boys that he had. And plus it was kinda hot. In the mood or not, he could recognize that.

There wasn’t really anything in the mail other than a couple coupons and a magazine from the guitar store down the street. Quinn wasn’t exactly sure how they got his address but whatever. He was flipping through the coupons as he came back inside. There were a couple of good ones for food and toilet paper. 

Jepha and Bert weren’t in the living room anymore so he supposed that Dan and Jepha actually let Bert join them. That was, until he went into the kitchen and saw the three of them in there.

“Hey.” He said and looked between them, “We got some good coupons this month.”

“Quinn, cut the shit.” Jepha said, “We’re worried.”

“I - well, I’m sorry.” He put the book of coupons down and stood near the fridge.

“I just wanna know what’s going on.” Dan spoke up, “It probably feels like we’re ganging up on you but we promise it’s not like that. You just seem off lately.”

He closed his eyes and sighed, “I know. I don’t even really know why, I just feel... unplugged.”

“Are you sad?” Bert asked.

He shrugged, “No? I’m not sad, I don’t think. It’s just kinda like... I’m just here.”

“How long has it been going on?” Jepha took a step forward, shoving his hands in his pockets.

Quinn pursed his lips. He hadn’t noticed it until recently but it had been there for a bit. He told them as much, “Maybe a few weeks?”

There was a long, unpleasant pause before Bert broke the silence.

“Do you think you should make an appointment with the doctor or...?” 

He shrugged again, getting frustrated, “I - I don’t know.”

“We aren’t forcing you to make any decisions right now, okay, Quinny?” He came up beside him and touched his arm, “We just wanted to make sure you were okay or if there was anything we could do.”

“You guys have been doing plenty.” He chuckled, “Every time I felt off today one of you were there to make me feel less... well more plugged in, I guess.”

“Well, it’s good to hear that.” Jepha smiled. He had that look on his face like he was in debate about something and said, “Is it alright if we hug you?”

“What, like a group hug?” Quinn grinned. He watched them nod. God, they were all such losers, himself included. As he opened his arms, he said, “You guys are lame.”

He got teased back as three pairs of arms wrapped around him and ruffled his hair and squeezed his ass. The last one was mostly Bert, though. It was over pretty quick with a few chaste kisses and promises to tell them if he ever needed to talk things out. He watched Jepha and Dan go into Dan’s room and shook his head. Bert got started on the dishes in the sink and Quinn rolled up his sleeves to help.

...

“Have I ever told you how pretty you are?” Quinn smoothed Bert’s hair down.

“I think maybe you have but I have a pretty shit memory, you should remind me.” He replied.

Dan and Jepha were still in the room next door when it was time for bed so Quinn and Bert ended up in Quinn’s room for the night. They were sort of half heartedly cuddling, just kind of talking to talk since neither of them were really all that tired.

“You’re pretty.” He told Bert, twirling a piece of his long hair between his fingers, “And you’ve got the sweetest smile.”

“God, shut up.” Bert giggled.

“Nah.” He giggled, too.

“Fine.” Bert challenged and scooted up so their noses almost touched, “I think you’re the most beautiful Quinn on this earth.”

“Even before Harley Quinn?” 

“She hardly counts.” Bert argued, “And you’re deflecting.”

“Fuck.” He hid his face in the pillow for a second, facing Bert again with a sigh, “Go on, I’m the prettiest Quinn you know.”

“No, I said the most beautiful on this earth.” He corrected, “I like making dinner with you every week. It’s always something I look forward to.”

“Even when I get dough in my hair?”

“Especially when you get dough in your hair, yes.” Bert nodded, “You’re a giant dork. Remember when we made zucchini bread together?”

“And you stuck a zucchini down your pants and told me to suck you off?” He deadpanned.

“Ha!” He covered his mouth with his hand, “Oh my God, I forgot about that.”

“I didn’t.”

“Traumatizing for you?” He teased.

“Absolutely. I have zucchini themed nightmares.” Quinn said.

Bert rolled his eyes, “Anyway, I meant when we accidentally dumped the batter everywhere and I started crying because we worked so hard on it.”

Quinn’s smile turned sad, “And I helped you clean it up before we went to the store and bought more ingredients to redo it.”

“It was totally my fault, too. I was being a bit of an asshole to you and you still wiped away my tears and sacrificed your favorite dish towel to clean up.” He reached over and cupped the side of Quinn’s face, “You’re always there for us, Quinny. For me. Let us be there for you, too.”

He opened his mouth to speak but nothing came out. Bert was just looking at him sweetly, waiting. Eventually he said, “Okay. I’m not always good at it.”

“I know.” His thumb moved along the high of his cheekbone, “But we’re all in this thing together, yeah?”

“Yeah.” He agreed.

After a beat, Bert asked, rather quietly, “Is it alright if I kiss you?”

“Of course.” Quinn said and felt his chest go all tight.

The way Bert kissed was still so intoxicating to Quinn. It was like all of his attention was on him, every ounce of his person was focused on Quinn. One kiss easily turned into several and by the end of it, Bert had his tongue in Quinn’s mouth.

“You haven’t, um, changed your mind have you?” He asked Quinn, laughing nervously.

He watched Bert adjust himself in his sweatpants. Maybe at dinner, he’d been a little down and the thought of sex sounded tiring but now, after kissing Bert so hard his bottom lip had a pulse in it, the thought seemed pretty damn okay.

“Yeah, yeah, I have.” Quinn said and moved to straddle Bert, “Is this...?”

“Yeah. God, yeah. Fuck me. You haven’t done that in - fuck feels like forever.” He sighed, “Quinn - I love - I love you. Mean it. So much.”

“Bet you say that to all the boys who fuck you.” Quinn teased.

“Oh yeah, the three of you.” He rolled his eyes and yanked Quinn down by the collar of his shirt, “Now say it back.”

He adored it when Bert got like this, “I love you so much I don’t know what to do with myself.”

“That’s why you have us to help you figure it out.” He said and pulled him down enough for their lips to meet in a bruising kiss.

...

At around two in the morning, the bedroom door opened and in walked Jepha and Dan, wearing each other’s clothes and looking pretty tired. When they saw that Quinn was awake, it was a team effort to move Bert in order for the other two to sleep in the same bed. 

Bert ended up laying half on top of Quinn with his arm across his stomach and head on his chest. He was going to have a hard time sleeping tonight, worried about Bert falling off the edge. Dan and Jepha were spooning next to them, Jepha closest to Quinn. 

“How was it?” Quinn whispered.

Jepha tried his best not to laugh, “Oh, fuck off.”

Quinn looked at him.

“It was good.”

“Good.”

“How was it for you?” He retaliated.

“Good. Haven’t gotten to spend time with just Bert in awhile.” He yawned.

Jepha yawned, too, “That’s good. Goodnight, babe.”

He was just about to say goodnight back when Jepha gently turned his head and gave him a quick kiss.

“I love you.”

He hoped that Jepha wasn’t looking at him because he was definitely beaming, “I love you, too.”

Quinn’s bed was definitely not made for four people. But it seemed like a waste of space when there weren’t four people in it.And sure, yeah, sometimes it feels like a jigsaw puzzle trying to fit everyone onto the bed but the other three pieces always make sure that Quinn’s apart of their final picture.


End file.
